Despite Election Defeat, Obama Sees Room To Push His AgendaPresident Obama begins his administration's final phase the way he began several others: recovering from disaster, in this case the loss of the Senate. He's striving to show he won't be a lame duck.

President Obama has begun his administration's final phase the way he began several other chapters of his presidency: seeking to recover from disaster.

Obama has moved vigorously since his party lost the Senate in November. Without consulting Congress, he's offering legal status to millions of immigrants. He's restoring diplomatic relations with Cuba. Above all, he's striving to show he will not be a lame duck.

The president took our questions the day before he left Washington for the holidays. The 40-minute, year-ending interview offered clues to his final two years in the Oval Office, which is where we met. NPR is publishing the conversation in three parts — starting with Obama's efforts to govern alongside (though not necessarily along with) a Republican Congress.

Something has changed since the campaign season, when Obama was delaying action on immigration, fearing political damage. That led to our first question: Why execute these maneuvers now?

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Obama added that it's fair to think of him as a president who thinks he has done what he had to do, and now is free to focus on what he wants to do.

But Obama is not entirely "liberated": He can't finish what he started alone. He'll need acts of Congress to complete immigration reform, or to lift the Cuba embargo. That barely begins the lengthy list of issues on which the president would like the help of lawmakers if he could get it.